Show 80 – SFlow and IP Accounting

During the EuroNOG conference I recorded a conversation about SFlow with Elisa Jasinska who is Senior Packet Herder at Limelight Networks. ( That’s what is says on her business card).

Joining me is Ivan Pepelnjak to cover the SFlow basisc and some f the more advanced ideas that you need to be thinking of when looking a IP Accounting.

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We kept the agenda simple –

SFlow: Why, What, How

About Ela

Ela Jasinska is a Senior Network Architect at Limelight Networks. Her work is focused on introducing new technologies to Limelight’s global network footprint as well as designing tools to manage and maintain the platform. She built and now operates Limelight’s Phoenix based Internet exchange, Arizona IX.

Previously Elisa has been working as a Network Engineer at the Amsterdam Internet Exchange, on projects such as AMS-IX’s route server deployment and their sFlow accounting software, as well as day-to-day operations of the exchange point.

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Greg Ferro is a Network Engineer/Architect, mostly focussed on Data Centre, Security Infrastructure, and recently Virtualization. He has over 20 years in IT, in wide range of employers working as a freelance consultant including Finance, Service Providers and Online Companies. He is CCIE#6920 and has a few ideas about the world, but not enough to really count.
He is a host on the Packet Pushers Podcast, blogger at EtherealMind.com and on Twitter @etherealmind and Google Plus.

sFlow is described in RFC 3176, “InMon
Corporation’s sFlow: A Method for Monitoring Traffic in Switched and Routed Networks”.

Also sFlow version 5 support setting the packet size from the default value of 256 bytes to a max of 1300 bytes.

As for CPU load – I have found that enabling sFlow of all ports on a Brocade box will generate approx 5-18% cpu load. This is not a problem as without sFlow the CPU sits at 1 or 2% – this box was a 384 port router.

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Who is Greg Ferro?

Greg Ferro is a Network Engineer/Architect, mostly focussed on Data Centre, Security Infrastructure, and recently Virtualization. He has over 20 years in IT, in wide range of employers working as a freelance consultant including Finance, Service Providers and Online Companies. He is CCIE#6920 and has a few ideas about the world, but not enough to really count.

Who is Ethan Banks?

Ethan Banks, CCIE #20655, has been managing networks for higher ed, government, financials and high tech since 1995. Ethan co-hosts the Packet Pushers Podcast, which has seen over 3M downloads and reaches over 10K listeners. With whatever time is left, Ethan writes for fun & profit, studies for certifications, and enjoys science fiction. @ecbanks

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